Rare historic weather observatory faces closure

The Library at Collegio Romano

How valuable is empirical evidence and long term data?

The Collegio Romano is one of the few places in the world with multi-centennial meteorological and climate data series (228 years!). Maurizio emailed me to let me know that it’s in danger of being broken up. He’s translated an Italian Petition on his site. I’ve copied parts of it below.

Not many people in the world appreciate how important and rare those long temperature series and historic collections are. It only takes a moment to sign the petition (see below for English instructions).

The historical meteorological observatory of the Collegio Romano, in operation for 228 years, has been told to vacate its premises occupied from 1879. To this moment, nobody knows where it will be moved to, and worse, nobody knows what will be the future location of its Library, immense historical Archives and collection of old instruments, a priceless heritage cared for during more than two centuries by many great people with lots of passion.

The closure of the observatory at the Collegio Romano is a barbaric act, against the history, culture and meteorological tradition of Rome and of Italy. The observatory is a precious piece of history that once pulled apart, will never recover.

The Library, known as the Central Library of the Italian Meteorology, has been claimed as state property in 1998, and it is composed of more than 15,000 Italian and foreign, rare and valuable books of meteorology and geophysics, some dating back to the 1500s. It is also the main historical archive for the meteorological and geophysics Italian studies in the modern age, and has been visited over the centuries by the likes of Galileo Galilei, Father Angelo Secchi, Enrico Fermi.

Alongside the books, there are many valuable weather and seismic instruments, showing the evolution of measurement systems in Italy. The historic weather archive – one of the few data series in the world covering several centuries – consists of over six million disaggregated data points for each weather variable.

SIGN THE PETITION
Please insert your real name (Nome) and family name (Cognome), a valid email (it will be used to confirm your support) and choose any password of your liking. You can leave a Comment in the Commento box.

Quotes taken from the referenced article by Kerry Emanuel, and published under the auspices of the National Association of Scholars

What the emails show are a few researchers behaving in a manner unbecoming scientists and gentlemen.

No, what the emails show are researchers, who are entrusted with public funding, conspiring to produce fraudulent, results in order to gain more public funding.

The true scandal is the attempt to catapult such behavior into high crime and to dismiss an entire scientific endeavor based on the privately expressed sentiments of a few (a very few) researchers working in an environment of ongoing harassment.

And quite right too. Fraud, whether scientific or not, is illegal in Britain and the United States, and most other countries. It is a high crime.

At the time of this writing, three separate panels convened in Great Britain, and two investigations conducted by the Pennsylvania State University have cleared the authors of the controversial emails of any serious wrong doing, and with good reason.

And were those panels demonstrably independent and impartial, and were the investigators unknown to the alleged perpetrators of the fraud? I do not think so, and it would seem that the majority of the public would agree. The term “Whitewash” has been frequently used in the media.

It is helpful first to remember that the emails in question were semi-private correspondence among scientists and that the vast majority of the email shows a high level of diligence and professionalism in conducting and reporting research.

It is helpful to remember that these emails were sent using public resources, on publicly paid-for time, and would therefore be subject to FOI requests, should somebody care to ask. To be imprudent in ones emails is regrettable, but is also a mark of either stupidity or extreme arrogance.

It is simply naïve to suppose that we never complain to each other about the unfairness of editors and reviewers and openly wish we could replace them …

Are but some editors and reviewers of publications mentioned in the emails were replaced under pressure. Mere coincidence?

… or that we sometimes wish we could keep data out of the hands of those we know are determined to misuse it.

But the data was kept out of the hands of those who could place a different interpretation on it. This is in conflict with the established the scientific method — share your data, see what other people make of it, and then compare your conclusions with theirs to learn more about your subject from the interchange. What is the problem with doing that? Why is Climate Science so different?

I feel genuinely sorry for Kerry Emanuel, he must be a very frightened individual right now, since public opinion is moving against the premise upon which he has based his career. I also grieve for the National Association of Scholars. It is sad to see any esteemed institution demean itself in this way.

In the end the evidence that convinces him of the seriousness or importance of AGW is either hidden or not convincing to others with a training in the sciences as well as a number of eminent climatologists.

In other words it is the opinion of one who believes climatology is so arcane none but specialists can understand it. Which is nothing more than an argument from authority

Cincinnati has the oldest functional observatory in the US going back to the days of John Adams. It too was to be leveled for redevelopment. But an eclectic group of history buffs came together and saved the observatory which has developed in to a very functional education center. It’s sad to see the wanton destruction of history.

Perhaps you can explain why the IPCC has billions of dollars to spend on all sorts of obscure and tenuous links to climate “history” (to the tune of $79 billon, I’m told) and yet has no interest whatsoever in protecting a critical set of measured historical data? Could it be that the IPCC doesn’t want to know (or promulgate) the real truth ? Could it be that the IPCC’s mission is more about politics, and less about facts and science? And, in which case, what is the basis for using their findings as a foundation for sound policy?

And yes, Speedy, funny how Global Warming is the biggest crisis faced by life on Earth (!), but no one is worried about keeping our oldest datasets, or too concerned about putting thermometers in the wrong spot, getting the scale right on graphs…

Thank you Jo for adding your site to the list of those supporting the Collegio Romano. And thank you and all that will sign the petition.

Personally, I do not think anybody is “out there” trying to close the Collegio because its curator is not an AGW believer. On the other hand, had the curator been an AGW believer, I am pretty sure millions would have poured in from the EU already. Likewise if the archives had contained incontrovertible evidence for the Hockey Stick…

It doesn’t surprise me, as Australia’s fraudulent political paradigm consisting of the greens and labor’s politically so so correct, including the csiro and the bom hide long range weather forecasts which do not fulfill their short term agendas. And with the end of the 30 odd year drought, run in fear of the truth where hiding any facts which will expose their folly .Who’s green pastures?